UMC Faculty Begin Teaching and Learning Dialogue
Enhancing the student learning experience was the focus of a retreat recently attended by nearly 70% of all University of Minnesota, Crookston (UMC) faculty members. The goal of the retreat was to begin a long term dialogue on teaching and learning that will be funded over the next three years by a grant from the Bush Foundation. The grant’s purpose is to support faculty efforts to enhance student learning through innovative teaching and technology strategies on each of the U of M’s campuses—Crookston, Duluth, Morris, and the Twin Cities.
At UMC the program will have three major components: 1) faculty cohort teams that will encourage reflective practice and participation in the use of innovative teaching strategies to improve student learning; 2) teaching and learning workshops and retreats; and 3) teaching and learning mini-grants to assist faculty in designing classroom assessment activities and in using technology.
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Marilyn Grave, associate professor of early childhood education, is the program coordinator for the Crookston campus Bush faculty development grant. She is working with faculty advisory committee members Dan Lim, Larry Huus, Sharon Stewart, and Lyle Westrom. According to Grave, “It’s really about developing the scholarly endeavor of teaching. We need to empower college students to take a more active role in their own learning. If we can nurture an appreciation of the importance of active and self-motivated learning in our students, they will truly become life-long learners.”
National education experts increasingly agree, stating that self-directed learning and enabling “learner decision making” are trends gaining greater and greater acceptance. The professor-as-font-of-knowledge paradigm is giving way to one of student-centered decision making with the faculty member serving as content expert, critical evaluator, and motivational coach.
According to national educational technology researcher Bizhan Nasseh of Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana, societal changes have also had an effect on teaching and learning. It seems college faculty today can’t rely solely upon their discipline related expertise to be effective; they also need technological competency. In a 2000 report Nasseh states, “The coexistence of the Internet generation and adult learners—with different expectations, abilities, styles, and needs—continues to change institutions of higher education’s missions, cultures, practices, instructional deliveries, and business operations.”
UMC’s Marilyn Grave concurs. “At the cornerstone of reflective practice and the scholarship of teaching is the idea that educators continually examine what they do and the contexts in which they do it. Because we’ve had eight years’ experience as a notebook computer campus, we’re in an excellent position to reflect and be intellectually engaged in the inquiry of technology as a tool and the assessment of the affect of technology on student learning.”
Dan Lim, director of UMC’s Instructional Technology Center, looks forward to building on what he’s been able to do to help faculty accomplish the process of integrating technology into UMC’s curriculum. “The question is not if a university has the necessary technology, which we do at UMC, but if the technology is meeting the needs of teachers and students. Technology should not dictate how teachers teach, but teachers should determine what technology is best suited for achieving specific learning outcomes.”
Grave is encouraged by the responses of UMC faculty. She refers to preliminary feedback showing that 93% of those who attended the first grant event indicated that it helped them renew their passion for teaching and that it helped enhance their desire to collaborate with their colleagues. She adds, “UMC faculty members have always cared about the quality of our teaching. We’re excited about the grant because we truly care about what our students are learning. The dialogue within the University of Minnesota system also provides us an opportunity to share our experiences with technology with other colleagues.”
The focus on improving teaching and learning at UMC comes at a time when other recent program additions and policy changes will add a certain synergy. In the last year the campus has moved from open enrollment to more traditional admission requirements, has initiated the First Year Experience Program for new students, has developed a living/learning community in the residence halls, and has restructured its merit scholarship program to attract more successful students.
Doug Knowlton, vice chancellor for academic affairs, sees the opportunities of implementing the Bush Foundation grant at UMC in tandem with the other improvement initiatives. He says, “Our faculty have embraced new ways to enhance student learning at a level not seen on other campuses, and this grant will facilitate an even broader array of approaches including collaborative learning, problem-based learning, and service learning. UMC has received a significant amount of regional and national recognition for it’s innovative technology-integrated curriculum, and this can help take us to an even higher level of excellence.”
Posted 09/05/2001
Contact: Andrew Svec,
218-281-8435